


Olives

by regionals



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: M/M, Some Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-12
Updated: 2020-03-12
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:00:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23112106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/regionals/pseuds/regionals
Summary: “It’s an olivebranch,you dumbass.”
Relationships: Billy Hargrove & Steve Harrington
Comments: 3
Kudos: 46





	Olives

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thursdayknight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thursdayknight/gifts).



> anyone remember that meme from like early 2010's tumblr about turning up late w starbucks  
> thats me posting this months after getting [The Ask](https://creion.tumblr.com/post/612345110630432768/10-oh-you-like-to-read-books-me-too-yeah)

Steve tries befriending Billy out of necessity rather than out of actually wanting it to happen.

As far as he’s concerned, Billy can go fuck himself, but he knows his life would be overall _easier_ if he were on speaking terms with Billy instead of taking a swing terms.

It’s not as if progress hasn’t been made. They can be in the same room without getting into a shouting match, and sometimes Billy doesn’t do more than give him a once over before saying, “Yeah, sure,” when he asks him to take over carpooling for a weekend or something. Part of his sudden _lack_ of aggressiveness has something to do with the fight and with Max threatening his balls with the nail bat, but Steve likes to think that, maybe, Billy’s warming up to him.

It’s kind of like taking care of a scared animal, he thinks.

The loyalty and trust comes with time and hard work. Steve doesn’t think they’ll ever be best friends, but he knows that if worse came to worst, he’d rather have Billy on his side rather than working against him.

*

“I still think you’re stupid for trying to be friends with my brother,” Max tells him, while she and Steve are watching Mike and Lucas take turns jumping from the top of the staircase in Steve’s house. They’re trying to touch the ceiling in the stairwell. “You have, like, nothing in common with him.”

“I feel like we have more in common than you might think,” Steve muses as he follows Mike with his eyes. He probably shouldn’t be letting him and Lucas take turns jumping from the top of the staircase, because one of them is bound to break a limb, but truthfully, it’s the least destructive idea they’ve had so far, and he needs to keep them all occupied for a few more hours.

“Um, no. He’s such an asshole, and you’re, like, _not.”_

Steve ponders the durability of middle schoolers as he watches Mike pop back up after taking a pretty rough tumble into the hardwood before he responds to her. “I wouldn’t say that I’m not an asshole,” he tells her. “I mean, if anything I figure we could bond over being assholes.”

“He’d probably sooner deck you than be friends with you, dude.”

“We’ll see about that.”

*

Finding common ground with Billy _is_ easier said than done. Steve tries approaching him while he’s picking Max up for something or other. She’s in another part of her house, their parents aren’t home, and Steve’s awkwardly lingering in the Mayfield-Hargrove living room.

Billy’s in here. He’s on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, and he looks like hell. Steve’s pretty sure he’s sick, and that it’s the only reason he’d been asked to drive Max around. Steve tries talking to him, tries asking, “How are you feeling, man?” and Billy just… Stares at him.

He looks up from the TV, nice and slow, and stares. He has this dead in the eyes look, one bad enough to rival El’s. They stare at each other for a few minutes, up until Billy simply says, “Out,” while looking at the door, and –

Yeah. Steve gets the fucking hint.

*

The second time Steve tries befriending him goes arguably worse.

They get stuck putting the basketball equipment away after practice, and Steve decides to ask Billy if he wants to hang out sometime while they’re rolling the cart that holds the basketballs into their coach’s office. (Basketballs are apparently a hot commodity for the thieves of their high school.)

Billy stops the cart with his foot, looks Steve in the eyes for all of two seconds and says, “C’mere, Harrington,” in an inconspicuous tone that Steve makes the mistake of not finding suspicious.

He walks over to him, until he’s standing face to face with him. Hell, he even watches Billy pick up one of the basketballs, but he still sputters out of shock and spits out, _“Fuck you!”_ when Billy bonks him in the nose with it. “Jesus, what the fuck’s wrong with you?”

“What the fuck’s wrong with _me?_ What’s wrong with _you?_ You need to get it through your damn head that _we,”_ Billy gestures exaggeratedly between himself and Steve, “aren’t _ever_ going to be friends. Stop trying.”

*

The third time isn’t necessarily the charm, and he gets called an idiot, but Billy at least _indulges_ him.

Steve’s in the school library, looking for a certain book, because, yeah, sometimes he likes reading, and there’s a library _right there._ He finds his book pretty quickly, and as he’s turning out of an aisle in the library, he sees Billy sitting at one of the tables with a book in his hands, _reading._

Steve takes a seat across from him.

Billy glances up at him, for just a moment, before looking back down at his book as if he weren’t there.

Steve says, “So, reading. You like reading? Reading’s, y’know, pretty swell. I love to read. Books. Like, I love to read books, dude.”

“You’re a fucking idiot,” Billy mumbles as he’s turning the page in his book.

Steve would argue with him, but, he has a point. “I’ve been, ah, made aware of that fact more than a few times.”

“I wonder why,” he drawls out, nice and sarcastic, eyes never leaving his book. “Are you trying to ask me to drive the shitheads around this weekend?”

“Um, no. I’m trying to give you, like, olives.”

At that, Billy looks up at him and gives him a weird book. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“That saying!” Steve goes on the defensive. “About olives, and like, making peace with someone, or whatever. I just figure I can give you some metaphorical olives, because I believe that both of our lives would be easier if we were friends.”

“It’s an olive _branch,_ you dumbass.” He starts laughing. Not loud, and not in the mean way that he does, but he laughs. “You’re serious? After I fucked your face up? And after I got you in the nose with that basketball last week?”

Steve shrugs. “Olive branch, olive _smanch._ I have a surprising aptitude for forgiveness, man. I mean, honestly, at this point, I’ve been trying to befriend you long enough that it’s less about convenience, and more about trying to see if it’s ever going to happen.”

Billy dog-ears the corner of the page in his book, and closes it. He slips it into his backpack, before leaning back in the chair, and crossing his arms and legs. He raises one of his eyebrows ever so slightly, and Steve starts to wonder if he fills them in like Nancy does, just because of how clean and _sculpted_ they look.

“Can you throw me a bone? Just this once? You broke my nose once, and you attempted it again, so like – you kind of owe it to me.”

If only just because it’s not the first time Steve’s milked their fist-fight for favors – although it’s usually in terms of carpooling – Billy rolls his eyes and lets out an incredulous, put-upon sigh. “I’ll hang out with you this weekend, _only_ because my other plans fell through. Not because you’re a bitch.”

And, yeah –

It’s a small victory but it’s still a victory.


End file.
